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Tuesday, December 27, 2016

Top Blog Posts 2016: music teacher posts

As 2016 comes to a close, I'm looking back on the blog posts I wrote this past year on the topic of music education. Today I wanted to share my top 10 favorite music teacher posts from 2016 (see my post yesterday for my top 10 lifestyle posts). I hope you enjoy this trip down memory lane with me, and maybe pick up some awesome ideas that you missed the first time! Click on each picture to visit the original post.


1. Classroom Jobs in Elementary Music (update)


The classroom jobs system has been a hugely successful behavior management tool for me, and the new job I added this year has been a perfect way to increase students' involvement in the classroom community while developing conflict management skills and empathy.

2. Center Activities


As I've spent more and more time using centers in my classroom, I've developed a long list of favorite activities to use. If you're looking for some new ideas or hoping to start using centers for the first time, this is a great list to look through.

3. Composition for Upper Elementary/Middle School


I did a series of posts on teaching composition this past summer. All of the ideas in this post are perfect for this age and easy to implement.

4. Composition Manipulatives


Another post on composition, this one specifically about manipulatives! I love using manipulatives with my students for composition. It makes it so much more fun and concrete for them!

5. New Ideas for Upper Elementary


I know I'm not the only one who struggles to come up with engaging, meaningful, challenging general music lessons for upper elementary and middle school students. These ideas were huge successes last year and this post was one of the most popular teacher posts from the year!

6. Things to Make for Your Classroom


Wow, this post got a lot of positive feedback this summer! All of the ideas on this list are easy DIY ideas for the elementary music room. These are perfect projects for a break when you have a little more time, so save this for your next vacation to-do list!

7. Behavior Management


I've written quite a bit about behavior management over the years, so in this post I rounded up all of those posts into one huge one to make it easier to sort through all of the information. If you're taking a fresh look at your behavior management systems, or are getting started as a music teacher, this is a great read.

8. World Music Series


To be completely honest, I don't think I've poured as much heart and effort into any blog post as much as I did for these world music posts. I wrote an entire series this spring with a different focus each week: Mozambique, Brazil, China, Native American, Philippines, Ireland, Maori, Bolivia, and Japan. I've linked to the post on Brazil here but you'll find links to my posts on all of the other countries in this post as well. Teaching music from a variety of cultures in a way that authentically gives students a way to experience and relate to each culture through its music is hugely important to me, and I hope you find some easy ways to do that in your own classroom in these posts.

9. Many Colored Days Lesson


I love this lesson idea because it can be adapted for a wide range of ages, incorporates literature, teaches a variety of musical concepts, and encourages students to think about their emotions in a constructive way.

10. Lessons During Concert Season


When concert season hits, it's hard enough to keep up with all of the logistics of concert preparation let alone think about lesson planning. But just drilling the same songs over and over to get the kids ready for the stage gets awfully monotonous (and can make you and the kids want to bang your heads against a wall!). Here are my favorite ways to keep things interesting without having to prepare any new lesson plans during concert season.

Well, those are my picks for my top 10 music teacher posts of 2016. Did you favorites make the list? Did you find a new favorite post that you missed the first time around? What do you want me to write about next? Leave a comment- I love hearing from you! I hope you are all enjoying your holiday break, and I look forward to another year with you all! Thanks for reading!


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